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Base Effect: Detect Undead 30. Functions as Blindsight for undead, so it does allow specific targeting, and bypasses invisibility and other sight-based effects, but for undead only.Essentia:Undead within 30' gain Turn Resistance equal to essentia

Bound Effect:Animate Necrocarnum Zombie, HD cap = Meldshaper level. You take damage equal to zombie's HD, which may not be healed as long as zombie is animated. Zombie can act immediately on your turn, you have complete control as long as you have Line of Effect. If this is broken, it acts on last instructions. Automatically regain control when you regain LoE. Only one at a time. Zombie returns to inert corpse if soulmeld is unshaped. No creature can be affected more than once.Bound Essentia Effect: Necrocarnum Zombie's essentia pool is increased by the amount of essentia invested in this soulmeld.

Soulspark Familiar - Good if you want a familiar

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Base Effect: Summon Least Soulspark, grants Alertness.EssentiaGives the soulspark various abilities, all essentia must be invested in the same ability. Choose between: Aligned Attack, Attack/Damage Bonus, Deflection Bonus to AC, Fast Healing, or Saving Throw Bonus. Note: this only affects the soulspark, not the meldshaper.

Bound Effect: Summon a Lesser soulspark rather than least

Feet Chakra

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Acrobat Boots - Good if you want bonus to Balance, Escape Artist, Jump, and Tumble

Bound Effect: Add this electricity damage to ONE melee attack, which must be declared prior to attack roll.

Lucky Dice - Luck bonus to various things, can share with allies

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Basic Effect: Use as Swift action to gain +1 luck bonus to one of the following: Attack *and* Damage rolls, Saving Throws, or all Skill and Ability checks. When you activate, roll 2d6. If the result turns up a 7, you gain this bonus to ALL of the listed rolls. Essentia: Increase duration of bonuses by one round/essentia. Since luck bonuses stack with themselves, and you may activate them every round as your Swift action, you may find yourself stacking bonuses up pretty heavily.

Bound Effect: Share bonus with allies

Necrocarnum Weapon - Good if you are going Necrocarnate

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Basic Effect: Bypass DR/EvilEssentia: +1 Profane bonus on attack AND damage rolls AND critical threat confirmation checks, but ONLY against living creatures.

Bound Effect: Gain temp essentia equal to essentia invested when you confirm a critical hit on any living creature. This temp essentia lasts 10 rounds. Multiple uses of this ability does not stack, it refreshes the 10 round timer. This works with a CDG.

Basic Effect: Create an aligned weapon: Chaotic: Battleaxe, Evil: Flail, Good: Warhammer, Lawful: Longsword. Automatically proficient in weapon. Immune to sunder and cannot be destroyed. If it leaves your hand, it returns at the beginning of your next turn (if that is impossible, it falls to your feet, and attempts to return to your hand on the next turn). Other creatures may attempt to wield it while it is not in your hand, but does not gain any of its special benefits. Essentia: Enhancement bonus on attack and damage rolls/essentia invested

Bound Effect: As a move action, charge incarnate weapon. If the next melee attack hits a target with one alignment component opposite yours, opponent makes Fort save or be Stunned until the beginning of your next turn. It is discharged on a miss. May only hold one charge at a time, but may hold the charge indefinitely as long as you hold the weapon.

Bound Effect: Share deflection bonus to AC vs evil creatures with all all allies within 10'

Lifebond Vestments - Good for limited healing

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Basic Effect: Touch living creature (standard action) to heal 1 hp/meldshaper level, take half that amount of damage round up. You may not use this more than 1/hour on any creature Since it references Lay on Hands, it is open to interpretation if it works with Caduceus Bracers (MIC).Essentia:+5 to healing cap/essentia

Bound Effect: You may heal a target up to 30' away

Necrocarnum Touch - Good if you are going Necrocarnate

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Basic Effect: +4 on Slight of Hand and Bluff Checks to Feint in combat. This DOES allow you to make checks untrainedEssentia: Grants melee touch attack dealing 1d8 damage/essentia invested to living target (Fort/half). This is NOT a negative energy effect, it may NOT be used to heal targets with Tomb-Tainted.

Bound Effect: Allows the Essentia granted ability to be used as a Ray with a range of 30'.

Bound Effect Swim up to your speed as full-round action, or up to half speed as move action. You take no penalties on attack rolls made underwater (as if you had Freedom of Movement, for this effect ONLY)

Bound Effect: Also gain insight bonus on Sense Motive checks equal to bonus on Bluff and Diplomacy granted by this meldshape

Soulspark Familiar - Good if you want a familiar

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Base Effect: Summon Least Soulspark, grants Alertness.EssentiaGives the soulspark various abilities, all essentia must be invested in the same ability. Choose between: Aligned Attack, Attack/Damage Bonus, Deflection Bonus to AC, Fast Healing, or Saving Throw Bonus. Note: this only affects the soulspark, not the meldshaper.

Bound Effect: Deflect Arrows, but you don't need a free hand to use it. This works even if you are flat-footed.Bound Essentia: Increases number of projectiles you may deflect per round by 1/essentia invested

Bound Effect: Gain incorporeal subtype for 1 round plus 1/essentia invested. You cannot voluntarily change essentia invested until duration of incorporeality ends. If it is decreased involuntarily to the point where the duration is less than the number of turns spent incorporeal, you immediately become corporeal. If you are within a solid object when you go corporeal, you are shunted to nearest open space, taking 1d6 damage per 5' of movement. You are limited to Meldshaper Level number of rounds per day of incorporeality.

Bound Effect: Single Living creature damaged by your spell make Fort save or be Dazed for one round. If the spell deals damage to more than one target, or if the target takes no damage due to resistance, saving throws, or other method of negating damage, this effect does not apply.

Basic Effect: Suppresses mental control (as per Protection from Evil)Essentia: Morale bonus on saves made to resist (Su) or (Sp) abilities of extraplanar creatures equal to essentia invested.

Bound Effect: When you are struck by an extraplanar creature, the attacking creature must make a Will save or be banished. Creature adds its HD as a bonus on saving throw, and you add your Meldshaper level to the save DC. If the creature succeeds, he is immune to this effect for 24 hours.

Bound Effect: Suggestion (as per spell) as Standard action (will negates). A creature targeted by this ability may not be targeted again for 24 hours, successful or not.

Soulspark Familiar - Good if you want a familiar

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Base Effect: Summon Least Soulspark, grants Alertness.EssentiaGives the soulspark various abilities, all essentia must be invested in the same ability. Choose between: Aligned Attack, Attack/Damage Bonus, Deflection Bonus to AC, Fast Healing, or Saving Throw Bonus. Note: this only affects the soulspark, not the meldshaper.

Bound Effect: When your Flame Cincture prevents fire damage, on your next turn, as a swift action, deal fire damage equal to the amount prevented by the flame cincture on the previous round (Ref/half) to a single target within 60'

Necrocarnum Shroud - Good if you are a Necrocarnate

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Basic Effect:+1 Profane bonus on attack and damage rolls any time a living creature takes damage while adjacent to you. This bonus lasts one round. If a living creature dies while adjacent to you, bonus lasts for number of rounds equal to creature's HDEssentia:Increase area of effect to 5'+5'/essentia invested

Bound Effect: At the beginning of your turn, any creature within the area of effect becomes Shaken for one round (Will negates)

Necrocarnum Vestments - Good if you are a Necrocarnate

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Basic Effect:Resistance to Cold 5Essentia:3 bonus hit points/essentia invested. These are not temporary hit points, and are not depleted first. This can reduce your hit point total below 0 if you reduce the essentia invested in this while low on hp.

Bound Effect: Any living creature adjacent to you at the end of your turn takes 1d6 Cold damage (Fort/negate)

Strongheart Vest - Good if you are worried about ability damage

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Basic Effect:Any time you would take ability damage, the amount of the damage is reduced by 1 point, to a minimum of 0Essentia:Increases the amount of ability damage that is reduced by 1/essentia invested

* NOTE: There is a long-standing debate about how this interacts with Hellfire Warlock. Some say that by reducing the damage to 0, you don't take the damage, an thus the HFW's abilities are negated. Others say that you are taking damage, it's just being reduced to 0, so because you aren't immune to it, the abilities stay put. Check with your GM before using this in conjunction with HFW to make sure you are both in agreement about the interpretation being used in your game.

Bound Effect: Also reduce Ability Drain by the same amount you reduce ability damage.

Vitality Belt - Solid defensive item

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Basic Effect: +4 Morale bonus on Con checks (but not Fort saves) and Con-based skill checksEssentia: Bonus hit points equal to Meldshaper level per point of essentia invested. Look at that again. For full Meldshapers, this is effectively a free die size upgrade to HD per point of essentia invested. 5 essentia = 100 bonus hit points at MsL 20. That's... pretty handy. Just be careful, you can kill yourself by shifting essentia away while damaged. But by the same token, you can give yourself a little more breathing room if you find yourself dangerously low by shifting more essentia here.

Basic Effect: Touch living creature (standard action) to heal 1 hp/meldshaper level, take half that amount of damage round up. You may not use this more than 1/hour on any creature Since it references Lay on Hands, it is open to interpretation if it works with Caduceus Bracers (MIC).Essentia:+5 to healing cap/essentia

Bound Effect: Remove the 1/hour limitation on healing

Necrocarnum Vestments - Good if you are a Necrocarnate

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Basic Effect:Resistance to Cold 5Essentia:3 bonus hit points/essentia invested. These are not temporary hit points, and are not depleted first. This can reduce your hit point total below 0 if you reduce the essentia invested in this while low on hp.

Bound Effect: When you shape this soulmeld, choose 4 spells of 6th level or less. You gain complete immunity to the effects of these spells as if you were under the effect of a spell immunity spell.

Strongheart Vest - Good if you are worried about ability damage

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Basic Effect:Any time you would take ability damage, the amount of the damage is reduced by 1 point, to a minimum of 0Essentia:Increases the amount of ability damage that is reduced by 1/essentia invested

* NOTE: There is a long-standing debate about how this interacts with Hellfire Warlock. Some say that by reducing the damage to 0, you don't take the damage, an thus the HFW's abilities are negated. Others say that you are taking damage, it's just being reduced to 0, so because you aren't immune to it, the abilities stay put. Check with your GM before using this in conjunction with HFW to make sure you are both in agreement about the interpretation being used in your game.

Bound Effect: Immunity to energy drain and death effects

Soul Chakra

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Fellmist Robe - Good for concealment

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Basic Effect:10% concealment miss chance vs any attack coming from more than 5' away. Your attacks are unaffected. A strong wind (21mph or greater) suppresses this effect, although it comes back one round after the wind stopsEssentia: +5% concealment miss chance/essentia invested (max 50%)

Basic Effect:+1 Profane bonus on attack and damage rolls any time a living creature takes damage while adjacent to you. This bonus lasts one round. If a living creature dies while adjacent to you, bonus lasts for number of rounds equal to creature's HDEssentia:Increase area of effect to 5'+5'/essentia invested

Bound Effect: As a standard action, make a melee touch attack against a living foe to deal 1d4 negative levels (Fort/half). For each negative level bestowed, you gain 1 temp essentia point and 5 temp hit points. Temp essentia lasts until end of next turn. Temp hit points fade after an hour.

Bound Effect: At the end of your turn, take an extra Move action. If you do, you take a -5 penalty on AC and all attack rolls until the end of your next turn. Furthermore, on your next turn, you can only take a single standard action OR a move action, but not both, nor a full-round action. Essentia reduces the penalty by 1/essentia invested (maximum of 0), but does not affect the reduction in action economy.Totem Bind effect: Gain natural attacks. One bite (1d8), one Bite (1d6), and one Gore (1d6). As a standard action, you can attack with any one of them, applying full Str mod as bonus on damage roll. As a full attack action, you can attack with all three, applying full str mod on all three. Alternately, as part of a full attack, you can make a secondary attack with ONE head at a -5, applying 1/2 Str mod to damage.

Feet Chakra

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Dread Carapace - Handy for natural attack damage bonuses

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Basic Effect:+2 bonus on damage when using a Bite attack, +1 when using a Claw or other natural attack. In exchange, take a -1 penalty on attack.Essentia: Increase both the damage bonus (+2 for bite, +1 for other natural attacks) and the penalty on attack rolls per essentia invested.

Bound Effect: 1/min you can add an enhancement bonus of 60' to your speed for 1 round. This is further increased by 10'/essentia invested.Totem Bind effect: When you charge, all enemies within 60' who can see you become shaken for 1 round (Will/negates)

Bound Effect: Move action for Tremorsense 10'. Cannot pinpoint the location of any creature. Every point of essentia increases range by 5'Totem Bind effect: Hands gain claws for 1d6. +1 enhancement bonus on attack and damage with these claws per point of invested essentia. As a part of a move, make Jump check to attack with all four claws as a standard action. If you do so, you cannot make any other attacks in the same round, regardless of the source.

Bound Effect: +4 bonus on checks to resist a bull rush, overrun, or trip. You are ALSO treated as if you were one size category larger than normal when making a check to resist a bull rush, grapple, overrun, or trip attack.Totem Bind effect: +1 Morale bonus on natural weapon damage/essentia invested

Bound Effect: When you charge, if your melee attack hits, you deal an additional 1d4 damage per point investedTotem Bind effect: When you attempt to overrun an opponent, the target cannot choose to avoid you. You also gain a +2 bonus on Str checks to knock down your opponent, with an additional +1/essentia invested

Bound Effect: Base land speed increases 5' plus an additional 5'/essentia investedTotem Bind effect: Bite attack deals 1d6. Use either as Primary attack or as a Secondary attack. +1 Enhancement bonus on attack and damage per point of Essentia invested

Hand Chakra

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Bloodtalons - Avoid this

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Basic Effect:You are not disabled by being -1 to -9 hit points. When you hit -10, you immediately die. Since specific trumps general, this actually bypasses normal immunity to death via damage, making this worse than useless for any build which might normally take advantage of being below 0 hit points.Essentia: +2 untyped bonus on Spot checks/essentia invested.

Bound Effect: Weapon Finesse with natural weaponsTotem Bind effect: Hands gain claws that deal 1d4 damage. On the round after you hit with a claw, the wounds bleed for an additional 1 point of damage per point of essentia invested. Nonliving creatures are immune to this. Every point of essentia also grants a +1 enhancement bonus on attack rolls made with these claws.

Basic Effect: Not disabled when -1 to -9 hit points. You immediately die at -10 or lower. See Bloodtalons for why this is bad.Essentia: Increase the negative hit point threshold by -3/essentia invested. If your essentia investment is reduced (voluntarily or otherwise) and your current hit point total is at or below the point at which you would die, you immediately die.

Bound Effect: While your hit point total is below 0, you gain a +2 morale bonus on melee attack, melee weapon damage, and fort saves. Totem Bind effect: Hands gain claws that do 1d6. When you grapple, you can attack with both claws, which are not subject to the usual -4 penalty for attacking with a natural weapon while in a grapple. +1 Enhancement bonus on attack and damage rolls with your claws/essentia invested

Bound Effect: When you hit with a Bite attack, you get a free Trip attempt. You cannot be tripped if you fail.Totem Bind effect: Bite attack deals 1d6. Use either as Primary attack or as a Secondary attack. +1 Enhancement bonus on attack and damage per point of Essentia invested

Arms Chakra

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Dread Carapace - Handy for natural attack damage bonuses

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Basic Effect:+2 bonus on damage when using a Bite attack, +1 when using a Claw or other natural attack. In exchange, take a -1 penalty on attack.Essentia: Increase both the damage bonus (+2 for bite, +1 for other natural attacks) and the penalty on attack rolls per essentia invested.

Bound Effect: Threat range of any natural attacks you possess is doubled. Does NOT stack with any other effect that increases threat range of your natural weapon.Totem Bind effect: When you charge, all enemies within 60' who can see you become shaken for 1 round (Will/negates)

Bound Effect: If you hit with at least two claws, you can Rend, automatically dealing double claw damage, including double Str bonusTotem Bind effect: You gain four claws that deal 1d4 damage each. +1 enhancement bonus on attack and damage rolls per point of essentia invested

Kraken Mantle -

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Basic Effect: +8 Competence bonus to Swim checks. With a successful Swim check, you can move at up to your speed (as a full round action) or one-half speed (as a move action)Essentia: +5' swim speed/essentia invested.

Bound Effect: +2 Insight bonus to melee damage and +2 Dodge bonus to AC while mountedTotem Bind effect: If you are riding an animal or magical beast with an Int of 1-2, you can handle the creature as a Free action, or push it as a Move action, even if you don't have any ranks in Handle Animal. In addition, your mount gains Evasion.

Bound Effect: When using this Detect Magic ability, you instantly determine the number, strength, and location of each magical aura present. You must still make a Spellcraft check to determine the school of magic involved in each aura.Totem Bind effect: As a Standard Action, you may make a melee touch attack with a reach of 5' longer than your natural reach. If you hit, make a Meldshaper level check DC 11+magic item's caster level to repress for 10 minutes. You may also use this to suppress a specific soulmeld, but you have to specify it.

Bound Effect: Limited Blindsense. Move action to pinpoint the location of every creature within 10' with LoE. Range increases by 10'/essentia invested. Any creature you cannot see still has Total Concealment and you still have normal miss chance when attacking foes with concealment. Visibility still affects your movement. You are still denied your Dex Bonus to AC against attacks from creatures you cannot see. You also take a -4 penalty on Spot checks, but a +4 on saving throws vs Gaze, visual effects, illusions, and other attack forms that rely on sight.Totem Bind effect: Once every two rounds, you can use a ranged touch attack ray for 1d6 Sonic per point of essentia invested

Bound Effect: Fly (average maneuverability) 10'/essentia investedTotem Bind effect: As a move action, can fly up to 10'/essentia invested (Average maneuverability), but must start and land on a solid surface or fall

Bound Effect: When you move at least 5', you can become ethereal during the movement, but become physical again at the end of each move. If you are in a solid object when you become physical, you are shunted to nearest open space taking 1d6/5' so traveled. While traveling so, you may be attacked by ethereal creatures.

Totem Bind effect: Bite deals 1d4 damage and has poison (Fort/negate 1d3 Con). Can be used either as primary or secondary attack. +1 Enhancement bonus to attack with this bite attack per point of essentia invested.

Bound Effect: Magical darkness radius 5'/essentia invested. You also gain Blindsight within the same radius. Magical silence negates this blindsight. You may end this effect as a Swift actionTotem Bind effect: Bonus to Listen also applies to Hide checks

Bound Effect: When you resist fire, you gain fast healing 1 for number of rounds equal to amount of damage negated. Doesn't stack with itself or any other kind of fast healing, use longer duration.Totem Bind effect: Standard action point-blank area effect deals 1d6 fire damage per point of invested essentia (Ref/half)

Bound Effect: Awesome Blow, but DC is calculated as any other soulmeld effect, so it sucks nowTotem Bind effect: stinger deals 1d6 damage + 1d4 Str poison (Fort/negate). May not use any other attacks when using this. +1 enhancement bonus on attack and poison save DC per essentia invested.

Bound Effect: BlinkTotem Bind effect: You can DimDoor as a Move action. Keep in mind that DimDoor still shuts down the rest of your actions that round.

Dread Carapace - Handy for natural attack damage bonuses

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Basic Effect:+2 bonus on damage when using a Bite attack, +1 when using a Claw or other natural attack. In exchange, take a -1 penalty on attack.Essentia: Increase both the damage bonus (+2 for bite, +1 for other natural attacks) and the penalty on attack rolls per essentia invested.

Bound Effect: SR 5 + 4/essentia investedTotem Bind effect: When you charge, all enemies within 60' who can see you become shaken for 1 round (Will/negates)

Shedu Crown -

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Basic Effect:Immune to being pushed back as a result of Bull RushEssentia: +1 Competence bonus on saving throws vs mind-affecting/essentia invested

Bound Effect: May shift to the Ethereal plane as a standard action, and back to the Material as a free action. Each day, you may spend a total number of rounds equal ethereal to your meldshaper level.Totem Bind effect: Trample attack. 1d8 Bludgeoning damage +1.5*Str mod

Bound Effect: At the end of your turn, you may take an additional standard action. However, if you do, you can take no actions, and you have a -5 on AC and attack rolls until the end of your next turn. Essentia reduces penalties by 1/esentia invested (maximum of 0), but does not affect the reduction in action economy.Totem Bind effect: Gain natural attacks. One bite (1d8), one Bite (1d6), and one Gore (1d6). As a standard action, you can attack with any one of them, applying full Str mod as bonus on damage roll. As a full attack action, you can attack wtih all three, applying full str mod on all three. Alternately, as part of a full attack, you can make a secondary attack with ONE head at a -5, applying 1/2 Str mod to damage.

Base Effect: Detect Undead 30. Functions as Blindsight for undead, so it does allow specific targeting, and bypasses invisibility and other sight-based effects, but for undead only.Essentia:Undead within 30' gain Turn Resistance equal to essentia

Bound Effect:Animate Necrocarnum Zombie, HD cap = Meldshaper level. You take damage equal to zombie's HD, which may not be healed as long as zombie is animated. Zombie can act immediately on your turn, you have complete control as long as you have Line of Effect. If this is broken, it acts on last instructions. Automatically regain control when you regain LoE. Only one at a time. Zombie returns to inert corpse if soulmeld is unshaped. No creature can be affected more than once.Bound Essentia Effect: Necrocarnum Zombie's essentia pool is increased by the amount of essentia invested in this soulmeld.

Soulspark Familiar - Good if you want a familiar

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Base Effect: Summon Least Soulspark, grants Alertness.EssentiaGives the soulspark various abilities, all essentia must be invested in the same ability. Choose between: Aligned Attack, Attack/Damage Bonus, Deflection Bonus to AC, Fast Healing, or Saving Throw Bonus. Note: this only affects the soulspark, not the meldshaper.

Bound Effect: Summon a Lesser soulspark rather than least

Soulspeaker's Circlet - Good for communicating

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Basic Effect: Choose a language when shaping this meldshape. You can understand the spoken forms of this language, but not the ability to speak, read, or write that languageEssentia: Each essentia point invested gives you another language.

Bound Effect: You may now speak those languages it lets you understand. You still cannot read or write them.

Bound Effect: Any creature taking damage from Thunderstep Boots also is stunned for a 1 round (Fort/negates)

*NOTE: There is some debate about how this works with Pounce. Some say that because the wording is singular, that it only affects the first attack in a Pounce, wheras others say it works on all attacks in a Pounce. Check with your GM about which interpretation will be used at your table

Hand Chakra

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Gloves of the Poisoned Soul - Would have been useful if it wasn't for the crippling limitation

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Basic Effect:Deliver poison with melee touch attack that does 1 Wis/1Wis (Fort/negates). No creature can be affected by the gloves more than once in a 24-hour period.Essentia:Increase Wis damage (both primary and secondary) by 1 point/essentia invested

Bound Effect: The poison deals Str damage in addition to Wis damage. A single save will resist both effects.

Lucky Dice - Luck bonus to various things, can share with allies

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Basic Effect: Use as Swift action to gain +1 luck bonus to one of the following: Attack *and* Damage rolls, Saving Throws, or all Skill and Ability checks. When you activate, roll 2d6. If the result turns up a 7, you gain this bonus to ALL of the listed rolls. Essentia: Increase duration of bonuses by one round/essentia. Since luck bonuses stack with themselves, and you may activate them every round as your Swift action, you may find yourself stacking bonuses up pretty heavily.

Bound Effect: Share bonus with allies

Mauling Gauntlets - Not really useful unless you use unarmed attacks. Might be useful for a monk

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Basic Effect: +2 Morale bonus on Str checks (but NOT str-based skill checks) such as those to break down doors or bull rush an opponent.Essentia: Increase morale bonus by +2/essentia invested

Bound Effect: Morale bonus on unarmed strike damage equal to the morale bonus on Strength checks granted by the mauling gauntlets. You also gain the benefit of the Improved Unarmed Strike feat

Necrocarnum Weapon - Good if you are going Necrocarnate

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Basic Effect: Bypass DR/EvilEssentia: +1 Profane bonus on attack AND damage rolls AND critical threat confirmation checks, but ONLY against living creatures.

Bound Effect: Gain temp essentia equal to essentia invested when you confirm a critical hit on any living creature. This temp essentia lasts 10 rounds. Multiple uses of this ability does not stack, it refreshes the 10 round timer. This works with a CDG.

Basic Effect: +2 Morale bonus on Str checks (but NOT str-based skill checks) such as those to break down doors or bull rush an opponent.Essentia: Increase morale bonus by +2/essentia invested

Bound Effect: Double critical threat range of any melee weapon you wield. Does not stack with any other effect that increases a weapon's threat range, such as Improved Critical or Keen/Impact

Necrocarnum Touch - Good if you are going Necrocarnate

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Basic Effect: +4 on Slight of Hand and Bluff Checks to Feint in combat. This DOES allow you to make checks untrainedEssentia: Grants melee touch attack dealing 1d8 damage/essentia invested to living target (Fort/half). This is NOT a negative energy effect, it may NOT be used to heal targets with Tomb-Tainted.

Bound Effect: Allows the Essentia granted ability to be used as a Ray with a range of 30'.

Bound Effect Swim up to your speed as full-round action, or up to half speed as move action. You take no penalties on attack rolls made underwater (as if you had Freedom of Movement, for this effect ONLY)

Bound Effect: Also gain insight bonus on Sense Motive checks equal to bonus on Bluff and Diplomacy granted by this meldshape

Soulspark Familiar - Good if you want a familiar

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Base Effect: Summon Least Soulspark, grants Alertness.EssentiaGives the soulspark various abilities, all essentia must be invested in the same ability. Choose between: Aligned Attack, Attack/Damage Bonus, Deflection Bonus to AC, Fast Healing, or Saving Throw Bonus. Note: this only affects the soulspark, not the meldshaper.

Bound Effect: Deflect Arrows, but you don't need a free hand to use it. This works even if you are flat-footed.Bound Essentia: Increases number of projectiles you may deflect per round by 1/essentia invested

Bound Effect: Single Living creature damaged by your spell make Fort save or be Dazed for one round. If the spell deals damage to more than one target, or if the target takes no damage due to resistance, saving throws, or other method of negating damage, this effect does not apply.

Bound Effect: Suggestion (as per spell) as Standard action (will negates). A creature targeted by this ability may not be targeted again for 24 hours, successful or not.

Soulspark Familiar - Good if you want a familiar

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Base Effect: Summon Least Soulspark, grants Alertness.EssentiaGives the soulspark various abilities, all essentia must be invested in the same ability. Choose between: Aligned Attack, Attack/Damage Bonus, Deflection Bonus to AC, Fast Healing, or Saving Throw Bonus. Note: this only affects the soulspark, not the meldshaper.

Bound Effect: Summon a Greater soulspark rather than least

Soulspeaker's Circlet - Good for communicating

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Basic Effect: Choose a language when shaping this meldshape. You can understand the spoken forms of this language, but not the ability to speak, read, or write that languageEssentia: Each essentia point invested gives you another language.

Bound Effect: You can communicate telepathically with any creature within 20' per point of invested essentia, as long as that creature has a language. This is a mind-affecting effect.

Bound Effect: When your Flame Cincture prevents fire damage, on your next turn, as a swift action, deal fire damage equal to the amount prevented by the flame cincture on the previous round (Ref/half) to a single target within 60'

Necrocarnum Shroud - Good if you are a Necrocarnate

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Basic Effect:+1 Profane bonus on attack and damage rolls any time a living creature takes damage while adjacent to you. This bonus lasts one round. If a living creature dies while adjacent to you, bonus lasts for number of rounds equal to creature's HDEssentia:Increase area of effect to 5'+5'/essentia invested

Bound Effect: At the beginning of your turn, any creature within the area of effect becomes Shaken for one round (Will negates)

Necrocarnum Vestments - Good if you are a Necrocarnate

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Basic Effect:Resistance to Cold 5Essentia:3 bonus hit points/essentia invested. These are not temporary hit points, and are not depleted first. This can reduce your hit point total below 0 if you reduce the essentia invested in this while low on hp.

Bound Effect: Any living creature adjacent to you at the end of your turn takes 1d6 Cold damage (Fort/negate)

Strongheart Vest - Good if you are worried about ability damage

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Basic Effect:Any time you would take ability damage, the amount of the damage is reduced by 1 point, to a minimum of 0Essentia:Increases the amount of ability damage that is reduced by 1/essentia invested

* NOTE: There is a long-standing debate about how this interacts with Hellfire Warlock. Some say that by reducing the damage to 0, you don't take the damage, an thus the HFW's abilities are negated. Others say that you are taking damage, it's just being reduced to 0, so because you aren't immune to it, the abilities stay put. Check with your GM before using this in conjunction with HFW to make sure you are both in agreement about the interpretation being used in your game.

Bound Effect: Also reduce Ability Drain by the same amount you reduce ability damage.

Heart Chakra

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Necrocarnum Vestments - Good if you are a Necrocarnate

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Basic Effect:Resistance to Cold 5Essentia:3 bonus hit points/essentia invested. These are not temporary hit points, and are not depleted first. This can reduce your hit point total below 0 if you reduce the essentia invested in this while low on hp.

Bound Effect: When you shape this soulmeld, choose 4 spells of 6th level or less. You gain complete immunity to the effects of these spells as if you were under the effect of a spell immunity spell.

Strongheart Vest - Good if you are worried about ability damage

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Basic Effect:Any time you would take ability damage, the amount of the damage is reduced by 1 point, to a minimum of 0Essentia:Increases the amount of ability damage that is reduced by 1/essentia invested

* NOTE: There is a long-standing debate about how this interacts with Hellfire Warlock. Some say that by reducing the damage to 0, you don't take the damage, an thus the HFW's abilities are negated. Others say that you are taking damage, it's just being reduced to 0, so because you aren't immune to it, the abilities stay put. Check with your GM before using this in conjunction with HFW to make sure you are both in agreement about the interpretation being used in your game.

Bound Effect: Immunity to energy drain and death effects

Soul Chakra

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Necrocarnum Shroud - Good if you are a Necrocarnate

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Basic Effect:+1 Profane bonus on attack and damage rolls any time a living creature takes damage while adjacent to you. This bonus lasts one round. If a living creature dies while adjacent to you, bonus lasts for number of rounds equal to creature's HDEssentia:Increase area of effect to 5'+5'/essentia invested

Bound Effect: As a standard action, make a melee touch attack against a living foe to deal 1d4 negative levels (Fort/half). For each negative level bestowed, you gain 1 temp essentia point and 5 temp hit points. Temp essentia lasts until end of next turn. Temp hit points fade after an hour.

Re: Soulmeld List by Class and Slot

Quick and Dirty per-slot discussion of soulmelds

Incarnate and Soulborn have most of the same melds, so let's start there.

Crown - It's hard to go wrong with either Crystal Helm or Enigma Helm, depending on if you want to be better in combat, or better at saying 'no'. However, none of the other Crown meldshapes are really worth bothering with, except in specific builds and specific situations.

Crystal Helm's Deflection Bonus to AC is pretty huge, and the fact that it makes your melee attacks Force effects is handy if you are fighting incorporeal types. This makes it actually better than the Diadem of Purelight when fighting things like Shadows.

Diadem of Purelight isn't a bad option if you keep getting the lights turned off, since the essentia also increases the effective spell level to keep even Deeper Darkness from screwing with it. Negating concealment is pretty big if you are a Rogue, although a Rogue wouldn't want all that light, so it's a tradeoff.

Feet Chakra - Airstep Sandals is really hard to beat. Flight all day long as early as level 3? Impulse Boots are good if you are constantly getting harassed by sneak attack or sudden strike guys, and the evasion is good if you're in a game with a lot of blastomancy being thrown at you.

Soulborn do actually get a handy unique bind in Thunderstep Boots for charge builds. It's a shame they suck so completely that you're almost forced to blow a feat on it.

While the other feet binds aren't bad, it's just really hard to compete with the mobility that Airstep Sandals grants or the defensive power that the Impulse Boots grants. And if you are charging in combat, Thunderstep Boots is probably the only feet bind you really want to be looking at, even if it DOES cost you a feat to snag.

Hand chakra - Lucky dice all the way, and never look back. Nothing else in this slot can really compete with them. You don't really have anything that takes advantage of your Swift actions anyways, the bonuses stack with themselves, and you can share the bonuses with allies.

Arms chakra - There's a lot of options here, although many are traps. If you want to be safe? Bluesteel Bracers and DONE.

Brow chakra - Planar Chasuble increases the bonuses you get from your Incarnum Radiance ability. That's pretty handy. Illusion Veil isn't bad for seeing invisibility. Most of the others you find here do much better in other slots, or aren't worth bothering with.

Soulborn do pick up the Fearsome Mask, which can be used in Imperious Command/Never Outnumbered builds, since it's an Insight bonus to Intimidate, but I doubt it will ever be worth the feat to pick up.

Shoulder chakra - Wind Cloak can be handy if you are expecting archers. Not for the DR, which is pathetic, but for the Deflect Arrows you don't need a free hand for, and can be used multiple times per turn. Good for a Jedi build.

Pauldrons of Health is the other serious contender for the slot, granting you immunity to some fairly serious effects.

Planar Ward can be very useful if you're fighting a bunch of Extraplanar creatures. Moreso if you passed up the Enigma Helm in favor of the Crystal Helm.

Waist chakra - Strongheart Vest. Done.

Heart Chakra - Often goes begging, really. Not much useful goes here. I suppose, if you want to do limited healing, you can do Lifebond Vestments here, so you don't have to wait an hour. This can make it spammable, but remember that you are taking half the damage you are healing.

Necrocarnum Vestments makes you immune to Stunning and Death effects. That's pretty handy, but it's an [evil] bind, which means you need to be NE to grab it.

Soul Chakra Fellmist Robes for Concealment or Keeneeye Lenses for True Sight. Those are pretty much your options here.

Re: Soulmeld List by Class and Slot

Rather than having a separate post for useful soulmelds, you could come up with a rating system built into each meldshaper's post, similar to the one gorfnab used for Mysteries in his Shadowcaster handbook or the one Saeomon used for powers in his Psion handbook. There are some melds that are must-haves, some are situational and some are traps, and you can rate both their bound and unbound forms.

Re: Soulmeld List by Class and Slot

I actually have this as a spreadsheet. But this is even more handy. Thanks.

I noticed that you didn't include material from Dragon 350 or psionic soulmelds or Dragon Magic. Do you need someone to write that up, or have you just not gotten there yet, or did you leave them off for some reason?

Re: Soulmeld List by Class and Slot

Originally Posted by Person_Man

I actually have this as a spreadsheet. But this is even more handy. Thanks.

I noticed that you didn't include material from Dragon 350 or psionic soulmelds or Dragon Magic. Do you need someone to write that up, or have you just not gotten there yet, or did you leave them off for some reason?

I don't have access to Dragon Magic, and most games I've been in don't allow it anyways. I lost the link to the psionic soulmelds that were put online by WoTC, and haven't had a chance to do the Dragon Magic melds yet.

Thanks, I'll get these included, even if they aren't particularly powerful. Most of the psychic ones are clearly based on some of the less powerful ones (Psion-killer mask instead of Disenchanter mask, Psychic focus rather than Mage's focus, etc...)

Re: Soulmeld List by Class and Slot

Ah, I did miss that. I would assume no; rules wise the wind is fluff only, and mechanically you're surrounded by swirling soul energy which bestows DR and keeps out flying creatures, but is not itself wind.

But, aye. DM call. Good catch, Shneeky, I skimmed and caught everything but that one thing.

Originally Posted by Anarion

No, we're not debating the meaning of life here. You shouldn't ask the question nor seek the answer from us. Go build it by doing things. Gather evidence.